Sports massage is becoming increasingly common at the amateur level, which helps support a multimillion-pound industry of professional therapists and massage tools. The purpose of sports massage is to assist athletes before, during, and after training. It benefits everybody who exercises since it increases flexibility, prevents injuries, and aids in recovery from traumatic injuries. Although sports massage has advantages such as enhanced recuperation, heightened performance, and injury prevention, it is also costly and time-consuming. Consequently, it is essential to outline the evidence justifying such an action. The research articles used in this critical analysis show that sports massage makes people less tired, lessens the effects of core stability training, and improves their physical, mental, and emotional health.
Low back discomfort that is chronic and non-specific is treated with sports massage. Standard therapies include massage therapy and lumbopelvic stability training for pain reduction and stabilization of low back pain. There has never been any research on the benefits of sports massage therapy in managing chronic non-specific low back pain in elite weightlifters. However, Joseph et al. (2018) examined how professional weightlifters with non-specific low back pain responded to the therapeutic effects of lumbopelvic stability training and sports massage treatment on pain intensity, pain pressure threshold, and tissue blood flow. Sixteen female weightlifters training for international and Olympic competitions were randomly allocated to cross-over experiments in the study’s balanced design. Sports massage therapy and lumbopelvic stability training were randomly allocated to the athletes for three sessions, with a 24-hour gap between each treatment and a four-week washout period. In both intervention groups, measurements of tissue blood flow, pain pressure threshold, and intensity were taken before and after each session.
Repeated-measures analysis of variance was used to look at variations in pain intensity, pain pressure threshold, and tissue blood flow. Participants in both intervention groups exhibited improvements in their tissue blood flow, a reduction in pain intensity, and a pain pressure threshold, according to Joseph et al. (2018). On the other hand, the lumbopelvic stability training group had a greater propensity toward broader therapeutic outcomes, notably in the degree of pain. Based on an improvement in pain intensity, pain pressure threshold, and tissue blood flow, the findings supported the therapeutic effects of lumbopelvic stability training and sports massage therapy in treating non-specific low back pain in competitive weightlifters (Joseph et al., 2018). In this case, coaches, doctors, and athletes may decide that sports massage and lumbopelvic stability training are the best treatments for professional weightlifters with non-specific low back pain.
Despite the many encouraging results, there remain research-related constraints. More investigation is necessary to evaluate the long-term benefits of lumbopelvic stability training and sports massage treatment among professional athletes. For instance, Joseph et al. (2018) investigated the short-term impacts of these practices. Furthermore, since only top female weightlifters were included in the study, its findings could not be applied to elite male weightlifters. Future research might change the results because of things like gender, level of motivation, anxiety, and stress.
The athlete’s current emotional state following sports massage is significantly related to the therapist’s and the athlete’s sexes. Sports massages are a crucial component of the support provided to players during training or competition and a traditional method of promoting physical and psychological recovery in sports. Only a few studies have been done to evaluate the mental qualities or even the general advantages of sports massages. Therefore, Reichert (2020) investigated how a massage affected one’s current state of mind. The investigation tested whether sports massage is effective regardless of the therapist’s or the athlete’s sexual orientation.
Robust sample sizes inform reliable research procedures in study designs. In Reichert’s (2020) study, 168 high-performance amateur male and female athletes—127 men and 41 women—were given sports massages by 15 licensed male and female therapists. The athletes’ current emotional state was evaluated before and after the intervention using the BSKE-EA17 adjective scale, whose items may be classified into five categories of the current emotional state. To ascertain the connections between the sexes, an ANOVA was utilized. For similar group sizes and group variances, Cohen’s was determined. Importantly, Reichert (2020) discovered that neither the gender of the therapist nor the athlete affected how a sports massage influenced the athlete’s mental state. The elevated mood increased when female therapists provided therapy to male athletes (Reichert, 2020). Therefore, gender has no bearing on how a sports message alters the mind.
Based on the information mentioned above, sports massages increase the positive aspects and lessen the harmful components of an athlete’s current emotional state. In essence, other prognostic variables like wait time, athlete age, or run distance had no impact on the self-reported mood changes from before to after the massage (Reichert, 2020). The distinct mental advantages of sports massages are confirmed by Reichert (2020). As a result, regardless of the therapists’ sexual orientation, sports authorities, trainers, and athletes may structure the staff of sports therapists more autonomously. Significant research limitations were present in Reichert’s (2020) study concerning sports massage. For instance, Cohen’s d was calculated in the experiment since there were no comparable data from past studies to establish the effect magnitude. It should be highlighted that the absence of a control group prevented a causal inference that the difference between “before massage” and “after massage” was brought about by the sports massage.
The argument over whether intermittent massage activities significantly benefit college students’ physical and psychological health has given rise to many research topics. Shen et al. (2021) conducted a study to ascertain the effects of massage on the physical fitness effectiveness, body composition, and physical and mental well-being of intermittent exercise participants. Shen et al. (2021) used two research designs: an ambient exercise experiment and a questionnaire survey. A questionnaire was later devised to evaluate the participants’ physical and mental health after the experimental research was completed to determine the participant’s current level of athletic performance and body composition. The SPSS 26.0 application was then used to run statistical tests on the data, including the t-test and ANOVA. After asking the participants about the study’s findings, multivariate analysis was used to examine the data.
Intermittent exercise may help university students improve their physical health and performance, as per methodologies and analyses. Intermittent exercise improves body composition and controls both physical and mental health, claim Shen et al. (2021). In this case, the interspersed exercise and sports massages improved blood pressure, body mass index (BMI), and self-esteem and lowered suicidal tendencies while increasing the performance of sit-ups and standing long jumps. Participants in intermittent exercise still experienced fatigue, headaches, emotional loss, and dread of despair, and adding sports massage did not significantly improve flexibility or cardiorespiratory endurance.
The research did, however, contain several serious flaws regarding sample size. The study’s participants were 20-year-old university students from Fujian, China. Shen et al. (2021) could not provide a sample size for verification and analysis due to safety precautions like academic success, daily life, personal physical well-being, and athletic achievement and capacity, as well as factors like funding, time, and staffing. As a result, the validation could not be extended to other nations, age groups, or occupational contexts. The abovementioned limitations also point to a study suggesting that an immediate follow-up investigation is required. Ambarawati et al. (2021) evaluated the effect of sports massage on fatigue reduction in support of the research by Shen et al. (2021). Ambarawati et al. (2021) investigated whether active resting or sorts of massage was more effective in lowering the lactic acid level in Indonesian water skiers. Eighteen water skiers from Indonesia served as the study’s participants, divided into two treatment intervals. Five days were spent doing the trial, with a three-day gap between each treatment.
Following active rest, the average lactic acid concentration rose from 44.41 to 7.29 mmol/L. Additionally, the study found no statistically significant difference between before and after active resting. The difference between sports massage treatments before and after was 4.1 (0.78 mmol/L), whereas the difference between active resting treatments before and after was 2.88 (0.54 mmol/L). The difference suggests that massage treatment is more effective in lowering lactic acid levels than active resting. Active rest and sports massage both have the potential to reduce lactic acid levels, but sports massage is more effective than active rest.
The sample size used, however, is this research study’s limitation. Although the inclusion of 18 Indonesian water ski athletes was necessary, the sample size was relatively small, which restricted its relevance for use in future research or other countries. The use of a small sample size also affects the generalisability of the study, making its applicability in other research domains nimble. The trial was also completed in a short amount of time—5 days, separated by a 3-day washout period. Consequently, the study’s results might be more about short-term effects than long-term ones. As such, its implication and scope for use by other researchers in narrowed to short-term benefits rather than long-term goals.
References
Ambarawati, N. E. D., Jawi, I. M., Muliarta, I. M., Linawati, N. M., Sawitri, A. A. S., & Dinata, I. M. K. (2021). The effect of sport massage toward the decrease of fatigue. Sport and Fitness Journal, 9(3), 155-160. Web.
Joseph, L. H., Hancharoenkul, B., Sitilertpisan, P., Pirunsan, U., & Paungmali, A. (2018). Comparison of effects between core stability training and sports massage therapy among elite weightlifters with chronic non-specific low back pain: A randomized cross-over study. Asian Journal of Sports Medicine, 9(1), 1-8.
Reichert, B. (2020). Does the therapist’s sex affect the psychological effects of sports massage?—A quasi-experimental study. Brain Sciences, 10(6), 1-11.
Shen, C. C., Tseng, Y. H., Shen, M. C. S., & Lin, H. H. (2021). Effects of sports massage on the physiological and mental health of college students participating in a 7-week intermittent exercises program. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18(9), 1-19.